Description
While the EU is re-arming, hybrid forms of warfare are successfully targeting the EU citizens’ mindset and voter preferences in local communities. Given advances in technology and hybrid forms of influence, traditional conceptions of EU security and defense, as well as related institutions, are increasingly less effective. Such institutions often prove slow and less effective in addressing internal vulnerabilities that are weaponized by third parties, especially in local communities and the private sphere. Current hybrid threats are already at play in European societies, in local communities that lack adequate defense capacity. This paper will focus on analyzing how hybrid security vulnerabilities and threats manifest themselves in EU Member States, in order to conceptualize how defense capacity in local communities could be developed.
